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Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., 9, 19713-19781, 2009
www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/9/19713/2009/ doi:10.5194/acpd-9-19713-2009 © Author(s) 2009. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. |
An overview of the SCOUT-AMMA stratospheric aircraft, balloons and sondes campaign in West Africa, August 2006: rationale, roadmap and highlights
1Istituto di Scienze dell'Atmosfera e del Clima, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Roma, Italy
2LATMOS, CNRS UMR-7620, St-Maur-des-Fosses, France
3DLR Institut für Physik der Atmosphäre, Oberpfaffenhofen, Germany
4ICG-1, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich, Germany
5European Ozone Research Coordinating Unit, Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK
6Institute of Geophysics, University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland
7Institute of Atmospheric Physics, University of Mainz, Mainz, Germany
8Max-Planck Institute for Chemistry, Particle Chemistry Department, Mainz, Germany
9Institut für Meteorologie und Klimaforschung (IMK), Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe und Universität Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe, Germany
10Danish Meteorological Institute, Copenhagen, Denmark
11Istituto Nazionale di Ottica Applicata, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Firenze, Italy
12Ente Nazionale per le Nuove tecnologie, l'Energia e l'Ambiente, Frascati, Italy
13Department of Atmospheric Sciences, Wyoming University, Laramie, USA
14Institut de Recherche pour le Developpement-NIGER, Niamey, Niger
15Groupe de Spectroscopie Moleculaire et Atmospherique, Faculté des Sciences, Université de Reims Champagne-Ardenne and CNRS, Reims, France
16Norwegian Institute for Air Research, Oslo, Norway
17Center for Isotope Research, University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands
18Central Aerological Observatory, Moscow, Russian Federation
19LTHE (UMR 5564), Institut de Recherche pour le Developpement-FRANCE, Grenoble, France
20Lancaster Environmental Centre, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK
21School of Earth and Environment, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK
22Laboratoire de Meteoreologie Dinamique, CNRS, Paris, France
23Chemistry Department, Cambridge University, Cambridge, UK
24Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research Utrecht, Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands
25Istituto di Ricerche per la Protezione Idrogeologica, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Firenze, Italy
26Geophysica-EEIG, Firenze, Italy
27INERA, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso
28Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute - KNMI, The Netherlands
29Wuppertal University, Wuppertal, Germany
30National Centre for Atmospheric Science, NCAS-Climate, Cambridge, UK
Abstract. A multi-platform field measurement campaign involving aircraft and balloons took place over West Africa between 26 July and 25 August 2006, in the frame of the concomitant AMMA Special Observing Period and SCOUT-O3 African tropical activities.
Specifically aiming at sampling the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere, the high-altitude research aircraft M55 Geophysica was deployed in Ouagadougou (12.3° N, 1.7° W), Burkina Faso, in conjunction with the German D-20 Falcon, while a series of stratospheric balloon and sonde flights were conducted from Niamey (13.5° N, 2.0° E), Niger.
The stratospheric aircraft and balloon flights intended to gather experimental evidence for a better understanding of large scale transport, assessing the effect of lightning on NOx production, and studying the impact of intense mesoscale convective systems on water, aerosol, dust and chemical species in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere. The M55 Geophysica carried out five local and four transfer flights between southern Europe and the Sahel and back, while eight stratospheric balloons and twenty-nine sondes were flown from Niamey.
These experiments allowed a characterization of the tropopause and lower stratosphere of the region. We provide here an overview of the campaign activities together with a description of the general meteorological situation during the flights and a summary of the observations accomplished.
Citation: Cairo, F., Pommereau, J. P., Law, K. S., Schlager, H., Garnier, A., Fierli, F., Ern, M., Streibel, M., Arabas, S., Borrmann, S., Berthelier, J. J., Blom, C., Christensen, T., D'Amato, F., Di Donfrancesco, G., Deshler, T., Diedhiou, A., Durry, G., Engelsen, O., Goutail, F., Harris, N. R. P., Kerstel, E. R. T., Khaykin, S., Konopka, P., Kylling, A., Larsen, N., Lebel, T., Liu, X., MacKenzie, A. R., Nielsen, J., Oulanowski, A., Parker, D. J., Pelon, J., Polcher, J., Pyle, J. A., Ravegnani, F., Rivière, E. D., Robinson, A. D., Röckmann, T., Schiller, C., Simões, F., Stefanutti, L., Stroh, F., Some, L., Siegmund, P., Sitnikov, N., Vernier, J. P., Volk, C. M., Voigt, C., von Hobe, M., Viciani, S., and Yushkov, V.: An overview of the SCOUT-AMMA stratospheric aircraft, balloons and sondes campaign in West Africa, August 2006: rationale, roadmap and highlights, Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., 9, 19713-19781, doi:10.5194/acpd-9-19713-2009, 2009.